Employers expected to add financial health to wellbeing programs
Tailored financial wellness offering is particularly attractive to recruiting young talent.
During this time of uncertainty and crisis, the importance of mental health and wellbeing is paramount. To that end, companies are stepping up to help their workforce get through these tough times by offering additional voluntary benefits to address the wellbeing needs of their employees.
Although the idea of wellbeing programs is not new, with the average employer offering over 10 programs, according to the recent 2020 Financial Wellbeing and Voluntary Benefits survey from Buck, the idea of wellbeing has been typically connected to good physical and mental health.
However, as we navigate the impact of COVID-19 on the U.S. economy, financial wellbeing will become even more critical. Companies are recognizing the need for additional support and are looking to ramp up their offerings to include ways to help with an employee’s financial health.
In fact, per the study, 63% percent of respondents plan to expand their voluntary benefits offerings in the near future to help provide the flexibility to overcome personal finance challenges which are increasingly necessary in this pandemic. These tools include assistance in reducing student loan debt, increasing emergency savings, and improving budgeting, according to the survey.
In addition, 58% of employers said integrating voluntary benefits with core enrollment was “extremely important” or “very important” compared to only 25% in 2017.
And in most instances, these voluntary benefits can address key financial wellbeing needs with minimal impact to employer budgets, which is necessary as corporate budgets are tightened, per the survey.
The importance of supporting financial wellbeing in the workforce was highly supported by the participants in the survey, with 91% of employers agreeing that voluntary benefits should support financial wellbeing.
However, they added that it needs to be tailored to the individual to be effective and “can’t simply be applied ‘off-the-shelf.”
This tailored financial wellness offering is particularly attractive to recruiting young talent. Per the survey, millennials are now the largest generation in the workforce and many are burdened with student loans, consumer debt, and a lack of savings – both for emergencies and for retirement. Per the report, millennials are looking to resources to help them plan for the future and companies are stepping up to provide these at no cost.
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